(Press-News.org) NEW YORK, 20 September 2010 – Immunizing children against preventable diseases is critical to achieving United Nations-led goals to reduce child deaths, global health and development chiefs said in New York today.
At an event hosted by UNICEF, the Republic of Kenya and the GAVI Alliance, health ministers, donors and the heads of UN agencies called for the introduction of new vaccines that can dramatically reduce deaths due to diarrhoea and pneumonia, the two biggest killers of children under five.
Kenya's Minister of Public Health and Sanitation, Dr Rose Mugo, said her county's expanded immunization program has reduced deaths among children from 115 per 1,000 live births in 2003 to 75 per 1,000 live births today – a 35 percent reduction.
"When we are able to introduce new vaccines against diarrhoea and pneumonia we are confident that the number will drop even further," she said.
Dr Guillermo Gonzalez, Nicaragua's former health minister and current Special Advisor to the President, said his country was reaching up to 95 percent of children with routine Immunization.
"Since we introduced the rotavirus vaccine three years ago we have observed 35 to 40 percent reductions in mortality," he said.
Margaret Chan, Director-General of the World Health Organization, said she was proud to lead an organization which together with UNICEF was one of the "midwives" that gave birth to the GAVI Alliance in 2000.
"Vaccines are one of the most cost-effective health interventions and one of the best buys. We appeal to the generosity of donors 'open your purses'," she said. "Diarrhoea and pneumonia are the two biggest killers of children. If you invest (in these new vaccines) you can save millions."
Government donors from Norway, the United Kingdom and the United States also pledged to keep supporting GAVI's global Immunization effort.
The United Kingdom's Secretary of State for International Development, Andrew Mitchell, MP, said it was a "global scandal" that children were still dying from vaccine-preventable diseases, and donors needed to do more.
"We don't want to balance our budgets on the backs of the poorest countries of the world," Mitchell said. "Immunization is undoubtedly one of the best buys in global health and GAVI is one of the most effective ways of achieving Millennium Development Goal Four. GAVI is focused on results – that is at the heart of our approach to development."
Amie Batson, Deputy Assistant Administrator of the US Agency for International Development (USAID), spoke about the need for smart spending.
"Through the Global Health Initiative, the United States is committed to targeting increased resources in a more effective and efficient way," Batson said. "We need creative new approaches to reach the millions of children who are not immunized because, at the end of the day, we will be judged by the lives we save, not the money we spend."
As world leaders gather at the United Nations this week to find ways to reduce deaths of children and improve the health of mothers, the GAVI Alliance said that decisions made by donor nations now will determine the fate of as many as 4.2 million of the poorest children in the poorest nations—the ones who are most likely to die in the next five years if they don't receive the vaccines that can save their lives.
In the last decade, despite the progress of developing countries in using more childhood vaccines, an estimated eight million children died from pneumococcal disease, a leading cause of pneumonia and meningitis, and five million children died from rotavirus, the major cause of severe diarrhoea among young children that is most deadly in poor nations. Experts predict that the introduction of the two vaccines can eventually save the lives of one million children per year.
GAVI Alliance partners, which include UNICEF and WHO, say they will build on the successes of the Alliance's first decade, when they delivered vaccines against life-threatening diseases to more than 250 million children, an investment that is expected to save 5.4 million lives.
In order to introduce new vaccines against pneumococcal and rotavirus and sustain high immunization coverage rates in poor countries, GAVI requires US$4.3 billion in new funding.
With widespread introduction of vaccines that can prevent pneumonia and rotavirus, most countries will be meet the critical Millennium Development Goal 4, which calls for a reduction by two-thirds of preventable child deaths by 2015.
INFORMATION:
The GAVI Alliance is a Geneva-based public-private partnership aimed at improving health in the world's poorest countries. The Alliance brings together developing country and donor governments, the World Health Organization, UNICEF, the World Bank, the vaccine industry in both industrialised and developing countries, research and technical agencies, civil society, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and other private philanthropists.
GAVI support consists of providing life-saving vaccines and strengthening health systems. Since 2000, more than 250 million children have been vaccinated and over five million premature deaths averted thanks to GAVI-funded programmes.
END
TORONTO, ON – Talking to yourself might not be a bad thing, especially when it comes to exercising self control.
New research out of the University of Toronto Scarborough – published in this month's edition of Acta Psychologica – shows that using your inner voice plays an important role in controlling impulsive behaviour.
"We give ourselves messages all the time with the intent of controlling ourselves – whether that's telling ourselves to keep running when we're tired, to stop eating even though we want one more slice of cake, or to refrain from blowing up on someone ...
Anti-malarial drugs are being used inappropriately for sick children in Zambia with fevers and difficulty breathing – a problem that can be addressed by arming community health workers with a simple rapid-diagnostic test and a supply of antibiotics, a study led by a team of Boston University School of Public Health [BUSPH] researchers has found.
In the study, published online Sept. 21 in PLoS Medicine, the research team from the Center for Global Health and Development at BUSPH addressed the widespread practice of treating children with fevers with anti-malarial drugs, ...
GAINESVILLE, FL—A new trend shows native wildflowers are becoming more popular with consumers. The wildflower seed industry has experienced gains in popularity over the past 30 to 40 years and is considered to be a maturing, highly competitive market. In Florida, for example, a 2005 survey estimated sales of native plants in the state totaled almost $316 million.
College students do not fit the traditional demographic profile of gardening and landscaping consumers, but today's horticulture students are tomorrow's decisionmakers—those who will determine how and if native ...
The brain uses biochemical signal molecules
Nowadays the biochemical language of the nerve cells is the subject of intensive research right down at the molecular level, and for the first time researchers, some from the University of Copenhagen, have described just how nerve cells are capable of transmitting signals practically simultaneously.
The cells of the nervous system communicate using small molecule neurotransmitters such as dopamine, serotonin and noradrenalin. Dopamine is associated with cognitive functions such as memory, serotonin with mood control, and ...
Solomons, Md. (September 21, 2010) – In an era when fisheries management is rife with controversy, new research led by a team of University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science fisheries scientists shows that a new, stakeholder-driven process can improve the way we manage fisheries targeted by both commercial and recreational interests.
In the September issue of the journal Fisheries, the team documents how this innovative process resulted in more content stakeholders while implementing more conservative harvest measures for the king mackerel fishery in the ...
Researchers at Mount Sinai School of Medicine have found that the naturally-occurring hormone oxytocin selectively improves social cognitive abilities for less socially proficient individuals, but has little effect on those who are more socially proficient. The study was published today in Psychological Science.
Researchers at the Seaver Autism Center for Research and Treatment at Mount Sinai School of Medicine and Columbia University wanted to determine if oxytocin, popularly dubbed the "hormone of love," could have widespread benefit in making us more understanding ...
EAST LANSING, Mich. — In the last two weeks, news media have covered stories on an Angus beef recall, oil-tainted Gulf shrimp and salmonella-infected eggs.
Anecdotal evidence suggests that such headlines affect consumer spending. New research from Michigan State University demonstrates how these announcements indeed cause consumers as well as food industry professionals to make purchasing decisions.
Consumers are not only quite attuned to food safety issues, but they also have significantly changed their shopping habits because of them, according to Chris Peterson, ...
BOULDER--The biblical account of the parting of the Red Sea has inspired and mystified people for millennia. A new computer modeling study by researchers at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) and the University of Colorado at Boulder (CU) shows how the movement of wind as described in the book of Exodus could have parted the waters.
The computer simulations show that a strong east wind, blowing overnight, could have pushed water back at a bend where an ancient river is believed to have merged with a coastal lagoon along the Mediterranean Sea. With the ...
COLUMBUS, Ohio – Mixed-use neighborhoods that combine residential and business development may help lead to lower levels of some types of violent crime, a new study suggests.
The results were just as true in impoverished neighborhoods as they were in more affluent areas, offering one possible way of improving blighted areas, according to the researchers.
But the findings come with an important caveat. In a sparsely populated neighborhood, increases in business-residential density actually leads to higher levels of violent crimes, at least for a while. However, after ...
WASHINGTON, D.C. – The presidents of six leading research universities and two higher-education associations joined Vice President Joe Biden and White House science advisor Dr. John Holdren this morning to discuss the scientific research and related activities that have been made possible by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).
Participating in the event held in the Roosevelt Room of the White House were France Córdova, president, Purdue University; Ron Daniels, president, The Johns Hopkins University; Elson Floyd, president, Washington State University; ...
